Probably I am not the only one who has been wondering about the apparent contradictions that arise from the various climate positions. Meteorologists claim that global warming has made a slow-down and describe the current epoch as cooler. Hence, temperatures do not seem to be in line with the predictions of the greenhouse theory. At the same time, others, like the World Bank in its November report, stress that the situation is worse than ever: emissions have increased and a temperature rise of four degrees is predicted for this century.

How should we interpret these contradictions? Measured temperatures have been commonly understood as…

Not only that this lady is correct, but she is right to be concerned. The northern countries like Finland have benefited from rising temperatures, but when the process is reversed they will suffer the most. Not that I am swayed by appearances, but I would be delighted to help out with my ‘magnetic’ hypothesis.http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AGT.htm

I put the following response on Roger Helmer’s blog, hoping my well known mantra here will reach a wider audience. :-)

In a debate of this kind it is very important to stick to facts as best we can and avoid emotional outbusts. On the question of temperature rise there are only 160 years of reasonably reliable worldwide instrumental records on which to base world mean temperature variation. Here is the Met Office’s official annual mean temperature data plotted between 1850 and 2010:http://www.thetruthaboutclimatechange.org/tempsworld.html

In viewing this graph, don’t forget that the Met Office is strongly pro-warmist and that the data is compiled by their own Hadley Centre at the University of East Anglia, major participants in the Climategate scandal. Nevertheless, despite this data’s dubious provenance, it still only demonstrates (see the blue line) a very modest long term average warming of about 0.4 degC per HUNDRED YEARS. This completely unalarming figure is consistent with the natural warming trend that has occured since the colder climatic conditions of the ‘little ice age’ of the 1600-1700s.

Superimposed on this long term natural trend is a much shorter 67 year cycle (the red line) which causes the temperature to fluctuate by about plus or minus 0.25 degC, and which is widely believed (even by the Met Office in a recent pronouncement) to be a natural ocean-related heat oscillation.

Looking at this graph it is easy to see how protagonists for the man-made global warming theory have been able to get away with alarmist statements about ‘ever-increasing temperatures’ without, of course ever mentioning the exceedingly unalarming rate of the long term rise. It was particularly easy for them to do this during the 30 years of the last ocean-related upswing from 1970 to 2000 when the rise was around 0.7 degC. If it had continued on at the same rate, which it did not, this would have been equivalent to a rise of 2.3 degC per hundred years, a spurious figure based on short term data that is nearly 6 times more alarming than the actual long term trend of 0.4 degC.

Sadly an unholy alliance has developed consisting of: academics whose theories were wrong; environmentalists for whom the GW scare was funding-manna from heaven; rich landowners who have profited mightily from wind farms at the expense of raised electricity bills for the fuel poor; industrialists and other commercial organisations who have profited hugely from government funding largesse; and politicians worldwide who always like great human causes that they can safely support (requiring, of course, great tax sacrifices by the populace).

Apparently this worldwide bandwagon is all now unstoppable despite the clear, simple, easily-grasped facts of the real temperature record. But then when have people-on-a-gravy-train ever been swayed by inconvenient facts?